Letter of the month: July 2004

[Web-master's note: The author of this letter
wrote back to request "if you would please remove my name and email
address from all sections of your letter, and make them anonymous that
would be much appreciated." Done. Can't really blame him, can
you?.]

When you draw a straight line from the A in Annuit to
the S in Coeptis, when you draw another straight line
from the S in Coeptis to the first O in Ordo, and when
you draw another straight line from the A in Annuit to
the O in Ordo, the pyramid as you can see becomes a
Star of David, a kabbalistic, occultic, and popular
masonic emblem.

Once this is completed, take the letters at each point
of the star (except that part where the Great Eye is,
since there is no letter at the end of that point).
Moving clockwise you have SMONA. When you rearrange
the letters you have MASON.

Now do you really expect me or anyone else to believe
that this is not a MASONIC SYMBOL?

} Date: Wed, 21 Jul 2004 13:53:52 -0700 (PDT)
} From: Anonymous Writer-Guy <anonymous-writer-guy@whoopdedoo.com>
} Subject: The Great Seal
}
} Dear Mr. Dryfoos,
}
} I noticed an article on your site concerning the Great
} Seal. In it the position that it has nothing to do
} with masonry is vigorously defended. If this is the
} case, then please explain the following strange
} phenomenon:
}
} When you draw a straight line from the A in Annuit to
} the S in Coeptis, when you draw another straight line
} from the S in Coeptis to the first O in Ordo, and when
} you draw another straight line from the A in Annuit to
} the O in Ordo, the pyramid as you can see becomes a
} Star of David, a kabbalistic, occultic, and popular
} masonic emblem.

This is a remarkable observation. A less insightful person would
instead notice that:

Graphic designers often try to distribute the printed words in
their design symmetrically with respect to the vertical axis, to give
the overall image a feeling of "balance". Hence the first and last
letters of the top words should and ought to be at the same horizontal
level. Thus, of course, the line between them should be perfectly
horizontal with respect to the design.

You can find the same remarkable effect in the badges of the
Lawrence Massachusetts Police and the Alameda California Sheriff, which
I have attached. In particular, look carefully at the Lawrence emblem:
a line from the P in "Police" to the final T in "Department" and another
line from that T to the C in "Lawrence" and yet another line from the C
back to the P in "Police" will give you that same astonishing
EQUILATERAL TRIANGLE ! And if you take those three letters PTC, they
anagram to "PCT" -- which is the police abbreviation of "Precinct"!
Mere co-incidence? I think not!!

One would actually get an BETTER image if one used the final "O" in
"Ordo", rather than the initial one, as it is closer to the
all-important vertical axis/centerline.

If one draws a horizontal line segment, and then specifies another
point vertically exactly below its midpoint, then one automatically gets
an inverted isoceles triangle, and depending on the vertical distance
(which depends on the length of the top phrase, remember?) that triangle
could become an actual equilateral one as it does in this case!

Not having a ruler handy, I used the tip of my red 0.9mm Pentel
mechanical pencil to compare the distances of the three sides of the
above triangle. Amazingly enough, the distance between the letters
matched EXACTLY the length from the end of the metal tip-end to the thin
black line (where the red plastic tip guard unscrews). And, if you
notice "Pentel" has the root "pent" which is Greek root for the number
5, and the pencil is made in Japan, which has FIVE LETTERS -- and 5 is a
very significant number in Freemasonry: the 5 Human Senses (not counting
thermoception, proprioception, equilibrioception, etc.) the 5 Orders in
Architecture (not counting Corporate Modern, Deco, Bauhaus, Hindu,
Moghul, Gothic, Romanesque, etc) and so forth!

The completion of the design from equilateral triangle to Star of
David relies on reading the Pyramid as a second congruent
equilateral triangle. Please measure carefully (I recommend
using either a small ruler or a red 0.9mm Pentel mechanical pencil) and
you will find that it is neither.

I would ascribe the immediate recognition of these non-symmetric,
non-equal triangles -- as if they were the two conjoined
equilaterals of a Star of David -- to the Power of Human Pattern
Perception. If I may, this is a concept I most strongly recommend to
you for further study.

Oh, and the six-pointed star or Star of David, is not particularly
a Masonic emblem either, if I may inject a little bit of logic at this
point.

} Once this is completed, take the letters at each point
} of the star (except that part where the Great Eye is,
} since there is no letter at the end of that point).
} Moving clockwise you have SMONA. When you rearrange
} the letters you have MASON.

You are almost entirely correct. But let me point out:

There IS indeed a letter above the Great Eye. Look up, up, outside
the frame of the Seal and you will see the H in the "The" in the "United
States of America".

(By the way: Notice that in the previous sentence I was especially
careful to leave a space between the "the" and the "H" and the "H" and
the "in" and the "in" and the "the" and the "the" and the ""The"" and
the ""The"" and the "in"!)

If you include that "H" you get (moving clockwise from the "A")
AHSMON, which is anagrammatically "Ham Son" -- which of course refers to
the Biblical descendents of Noah through his son Ham, which in folklore
is widely considered to be the Black Races of Africa and their
descendents.

This of course indicates that the Great Seal is actually a Symbol
of the "Prince Hall" (Black) branch of Masonry. The original African
Lodge No. 1, was founded by Prince Hall and his African-descended
brethren on July 3, 1775. Notice that this is precisely "A Year and
A Day" (the traditional folkloric waiting period) before the
foundation date of July 4 1776 of the USA, commemorated as the
"MDCCLXXVI" on the very base of the Pyramid in the Great Seal!
Co-incidence? I think not!

} Now do you really expect me or anyone else to believe
} that this is not a MASONIC SYMBOL?

That is, of course, a two-part question.

Do I expect other people to believe that the Great Seal of
the United States is not a masonic symbol, or as you put it "not a
MASONIC SYMBOL". Yes, of course I do. The evidence presented in that
article is both clear and persuasive.

Do I expect you to believe it's not a "MASONIC SYMBOL" ??
Of course not. But that's your problem, not mine. You're the one who
has to wonder if I'm making all this stuff up to hide the "truth" and
that if I am (because I'm a Mason, remember?) then how could you believe
anything I tell you anyway? You're the one having the epistemological
dilemma, not me.

Oh, and besides which, that's not how "MASONIC SYMBOLS" work, anyway.
Some examples of a "masonic symbol" would be:

the builder's square, a symbol of accuracy and rightness, and also
of fairness and reciprocity in human relations; as in the sayings "a
square deal", "fair and square", "on the square" and so on, not to
mention "the right angle",

architect's or geometer's compasses, which is a symbol of
self-restraint and appropriate personal boundaries,

the chisel or the stone gavel, a symbol of self-improvement by
removal of the excessive, the blemished, the unfit in each person's life
and habits.

Those are how Masonic symbols work (and they're not secret either). Our
symbols are for indicating, representing, and teaching spiritual
lessons.

What would even be the point of using a secret symbol that most
people could not even understand? Do you imagine that Masons are just a
society of powerful gloaters who have nothing better to do than get a
secret thrill looking at their own dollar bills? It's not like the
symbol gives us power over all the money, nor permission to take other
people's dollar bills just because they have "our" symbol on them.
Although, if you think it does, please feel free to send all of your
dollar bills to me at my post office box. I'll be sure to send you an
Official Masonic Receipt.

Finally, please notice that if you take the same symbol and draw a
straight line from T in "ANNUIT" to the O in "SECLORUM" to the I in
"COEPTIS"to the D in "ORDO" to the I in "ANNUIT", you will get a pair of
scalene triangles, resembling a schematic "butterfly" image,
indicating:

the "Butterfly Effect" -- known in Chaos Theory mathematics, a new
and secret branch of mathematics known only to Masons, of course. Also
sometimes described as "exteme sensitivity to initial conditions". Jeff
Goldblum (a Jew and therefore necessarily a Mason, right?) explains this
effect in the movie Jurassic Park.

Further, the letters TOIDI can be anagrammed, to a result that you
are invited to find for yourself.